Bill Pannell, Fuller Scholar and Civil Rights Advocate, Dies

‘Coming Race Wars’ Author Pushed Evangelicals to Engage in Racial Politics

Bill Pannell, who made history by becoming Fuller Theological Seminary’s first black faculty member, died Friday, Oct. 11. He was 95.

William Pannell / Photo courtesy of Fuller Theological Seminary

Known for his 1993 book, “The Coming Race Wars?: A Cry for Reconciliation,: Pannell was born in Sturgis, Michigan, in 1929. His encounters with racial bigotry during the pre-Civil Rights Movement era colored his view of evangelism in a way that put him at odds with his white evangelical contemporaries but also helped pave the road to a future academic career.

“Bill Pannell’s winsome personality, thoughtful engagement, faithful witness, and pioneering spirit won many hearts and earned much respect from students, colleagues, and believers near and far,” said Fuller Seminary President David Emmanuel Goatley in an online statement. “His participation in my inauguration as Fuller’s sixth and first African American president was an important moment for him to experience, and in many ways, I, along with many others, stand on his shoulders. He is now one of the many saints of the ages who ‘rest from their labors, for their deeds follow them’ (Rev. 14:13).”

After committing his life to Christ in junior high, Pannell attended Fort Wayne Bible College and traveled the country helping lead revivals. While many white evangelicals of the time argued that Christians should focus on the Gospel and not be distracted by social issues, Pannell advocated for the church to confront racism politically.

Pannell’s 1968 book, “My Friend, The Enemy,” tells of his frustration over how the Gospel was the antithesis of racism, yet the preachers of the Gospel refused to address racism itself.

Later, as the debate shifted from whether Christians should address racism to how Christians should address racism, Pannell authored “The Coming Race Wars.” That book, published in the aftermath of the Rodney King race riots, argued that racial prejudice remained a systemic problem.

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After George Floyd’s 2020 death sparked a new wave of race riots, Pannell released an expanded edition in which he criticized white evangelicals and Donald Trump while sympathizing with the leftist political views of Black Lives Matter.

“The question of the Black man from Los Angeles loomed large thirty years ago,” Pannell wrote, “and it still throbs with meaning.”

Pannell joined Fuller’s board of trustees in 1971, and in 1974 he joined the faculty as assistant professor of evangelism and director of the Black Pastor’s Program. He continued to teach there for 40 years, became dean of the chapel, and in 2014 was honored with emeritus faculty status. In 2015, the seminary renamed its African American Church Studies Program as the William E. Pannell Center for Black Church Studies.

Pannell is survived by his son Peter and preceded in death by his oldest son, Philip (2015), and his wife, Hazel (2021), who he married in 1955.

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